There is a trend towards increased mobility in today's society. People want, for example, to be able to communicate, retrieve information, order goods and services, and carry out various tasks regardless of where they are and independent of access to stationary devices. In order to meet this requirement, a number of portable and hand-held devices have been developed, such as portable computers, mobile telephones, PDAs and reading pens.
A further category of hand-held devices is electronic pens, using which it is possible to write and draw in the same way as with an ordinary pen, but which at the same time electronically record what is written by means of a sensor, for example a CCD or an accelerometer.
The Applicant has developed an electronic pen that is intended to be used on a surface which is provided with a position-coding pattern and which has an optical sensor which continually reads off the position-coding pattern in order to record what is written electronically in the form of coordinates. The position-coding pattern and the pen is described in e.g. WO 01/26032, which is hereby incorporated by reference. A pen of a similar type is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,852,434.
The Applicant's pen can, among other things, be used to write messages and to send these via a mobile phone to another mobile phone or via the mobile phone and the Internet to a computer.
There is, however, a wish to be able to use an electronic pen for purposes other than recording text and sending messages.